


Abracadabra

by pnt_boi



Category: Now You See Me (2013)
Genre: Four Horsemen, M/M, Magic, No mr. elephant, Slash, but then, card tricks, idk?, not here, this happened?, this started out as something cute, uh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-13
Updated: 2014-02-13
Packaged: 2018-01-12 04:17:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1181789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pnt_boi/pseuds/pnt_boi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack Wilder has quick hands and a cute smile, and he never reveals his secrets.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Abracadabra

**Author's Note:**

> I watched the movie once and was all "OMFG DANNY AND JACK THO" and thus, this fic was born.  
> Hope you enjoy! If I got anything wrong (canonically, grammatically, etc.), feel free to point it out!

Jack’s a cute kid, Daniel thinks. He’s got a bright smile, a downright adorable accent, and his cute little bad boy act is endearing beyond words. The glass-half-full attitude really gets him, though. _Nothing’s ever locked_. Aw. How sweet, a little optimist in their pack of pessimists. Danny could cry. Honestly.  
  
His eyes are wide and teary when Merritt tells him he’s going to die. He even has this precious little stutter. _W-w-whaddya mean? I… I th-thou-ght we…_ Danny almost kisses that stupid frown off the kid’s face (he restrains himself though. Henley and Merritt are right there. Daddy isn’t going to ravish Mommy in front of the kids). Henley says It’s a fake death, and elbows Merritt in the spleen. The relief on Jack’s face is almost comical.  
  
Jack’s dorky grin after they pull off the first show is enough to make Daniel melt. The kid doesn’t even break character when the put him in handcuffs, either (Jack in handcuffs? _Hello, Danny’s new wet dream_ ). His bright smile stays in place all the way to the interrogation room, and if Danny’s brain wasn’t so preoccupied (still thinking about the handcuffs), he’d be worried. Poor little scrap like Jack, face-to-face with the big dogs? The kid would have his tail between his fucking legs in no time.  
  
They’re free by afternoon, though, with the aid of Danny’s magic handcuffs/key-in-the-coke-can trick. Their show and secrets (and Jack) are safe. He rides to the airport with Daniel, too, and neither of them can keep from laughing. “You should’ve seen his face,” Danny says, breathless. “Jackass didn’t even know what was happening.”  
  
The second show goes off without a hitch. The lovely citizens of New Orleans get a generous, 140 million dollar donation from the Four Horseman’s benefactor. They run from the police afterwards, and Danny almost gets caught, but not quite. Jack slips the tracker into Rhodes’s pocket, and the night ends with a gloriously self-loathing detective throwing back shots, and four horsemen riding off into the sunset, well on their way to New York.  
  
“I almost got shot,” Danny says after they’re ten thousand feet above Georgia. Henley is asleep on Merritt’s shoulder a few rows away. Jack fiddles with Danny’s deck of cards, cross-legged in the aisle. The overhead light makes his eyes gleam.  
  
“But you didn’t,” Jack says (the optimism is really getting to Danny. He even smiles at it this time). He fans out the deck of cards in his hands. Smiling, he tells him, “Pick a card.”  
  
Danny does, smirking. How cute. Little Jacky is gonna try to fool him. It’s a nice sentiment, truly, but it can’t be done.  
  
He looks at it. Six of clubs. Jack says, “Okay. Now, think of a number.”  
  
“Any number?”  
  
“Any number.”  
  
Because he’s a perverted jackass, Danny thinks of 69.  
  
Jack gives Danny a purple sharpie he’d pulled from under a seat. “Write it on there.” He’s still smiling and Danny feels the sudden, overwhelming urge to attack Jack’s mouth with his own.  
  
He mutters something about having to get a new deck (which is total bullshit because Danny has at least three decks on his person at all times), and, in his hasty penmanship, scrawls out sixty-nine (spelled out. It makes him seem less pervy that way). Jack instructs him to reinsert it into the deck, and think of his number.  
  
Danny smirks. “Are you gonna read my mind or something?”  
  
Jack’s smile widens, and Danny shuts up and concentrates on his number. (Or tries to, at least. His mind has dumped the handcuffs fantasy and moved on to 69ing.) Jack shuffles the deck, hands just a flash of movement, a blur of pale skin. They move too quick for Danny to keep up, and, before he has time to blink, Jack’s finished shuffling.  
  
“So what’s the trick?”  
  
“You’ll see. First, tell me what your number was.”  
  
“Shouldn’t you know that already?” Jack raises an eyebrow. “Okay, okay. Sixty-nine.”  
  
“I expected nothing less.”  
  
“What’s the trick, then?”  
  
“Let me ask you something, first.”  
  
“Fire away.”  
  
“How did you get started with magic?”  
  
Danny cringes. Touchy subject. “Not relevant,” he says, lacing his fingers together.  
  
“Sure it is,” Jack insists. He fumbles with the deck for a minute more. “Your story can’t be worse than mine.”  
  
“You don’t know that.”  
  
“Sure I do. Merritt’s been teaching me mind tricks. I know everything.” Jack grins, wide and beaming, and - yeah - it’s adorable. His face goes soft after a moment. “I swear not to tell the others. I… I just wanna know.”  
  
 _Goddamnit_ , Danny thinks. _Couldn’t resist this kid if you tried._  
  
“I… When I was a kid, I was the odd one out in my family. The others had their lives planned out by the time they were six. I was the rouge kid with a deck of cards and no idea where he was going. My parents lost hope with me pretty early, and the only way I could get their attention was if I did something impressive.”  
  
“Like your magic?”  
  
Danny nods, pointedly looking at everything except Jack. “Yeah. They’d watch my tricks, and they’d smile or something, and I basically clung to that. It was a way for me to be noticed…”  
  
Jack pokes Danny’s leg with the deck of cards, coaxing him to meet his eyes. Danny does (reluctantly). Jack’s smiling, eyes full of something… fond, and Danny doesn’t think he’s cute or adorable or anything this time. He thinks he’s beautiful. His heart aches with the overwhelming want, and his breath hitches. It takes a lot to throw off J. Daniel Atlas, but Jack Wilder had done it without even trying.  
  
“I’m sure they notice you now.”  
  
Danny laughs breathily. “Yeah. Probably.”  
  
There’s a long pause before Jack says, “Check your wallet.”  
  
He does, pulling it out from his back pocket and flipping it open. There, slipped behind his driver’s license, is a six of clubs with the sixty-nine written on it in bold, almost-illegible handwriting. Danny smiles. _Sneaky bastard_ , he thinks.  
  
There’s a moment of silence while Jack shuffles the cards again. Merritt snores in the background, mumbling something that sounds like _No, Mr. Elephant. Not here_ , and Danny and Jack both write it off on too many drinks.  
  
“I notice you, too,” Jack whispers. Danny isn’t sure if he’s supposed to hear it or not.  
  
“How did _you_ get started in magic?” he asks, ignoring Jack’s confession with his usual arrogance.  
  
“I stole a Svengali deck off of a dead guy when I was eight.”  
  
For some unfathomable reason, Danny finds this absolutely hilarious, and he laughs until he’s breathless. Jack throws the deck of cards at him. (It only makes him laugh harder, and Jack smiles with him after awhile.)  
  
+  
  
Jack dies an honorable fake-death, and Danny’s voice cracks when the other three horsemen film the video about their final performance.  
  
“Nice acting,” Merritt says after they finish, punching him in the shoulder. “You looked like you were actually sad.”  
  
(Danny doesn’t tell them that he was, doesn’t tell them that all he was thinking was _What if Jack were actually dead? What if it wasn’t some nameless corpse in that car, but Jack, and he’d exploded in that crash, and you’d have never seen him again? What if you never got to tell him how you feel? What if, what if, what if?_ )  
  
+  
  
They explode into mpney at their final show, jumping off the edge of the roof. The detective and Interpol agent catch onto their act, but not soon enough. The Horsemen are still seven steps ahead.  
  
Danny thinks about Jack until they get to the park. The gates are locked, looming over them in the darkness, mocking them. _You came this far_ , they say, _but it wasn’t enough. So very close, yet so very far_. Danny is pissed and seconds away from just taking a stick of C-4 to the damned things.  
  
Jack is there, though. “Weren’t you guys paying attention? Nothing’s ever locked,” he says, and Danny laughs. He wants to kiss him again, so, as soon as the gate’s out of the way, he does.  
  
Henley and Merritt stay politely quiet, knowingly smirking at each other. Danny sees them begin to wander around the park, giving them space.  
  
Jack is an amazing kisser, even if it’s over too quickly. They’re breathless when they part, breathing into each other’s mouths in an attempt to get a hold of themselves. “I’ve wanted that to happen since… forever…” Jack pants, eyes gleaming under the stars, a spark of color in the dark of night.  
  
“Same here,” Danny mumbles, pressing his forehead into Jack’s. Seconds go by, and they could be years for all Danny knows. “You aren’t just a kid.” He whispers, his voice heavy with emotion.  
  
“I know.”  
  
“ _Agent Rhodes_?”


End file.
